ECHOES FROM THE SOUTH.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VI, Issue 25, 21 June 1890, Page 10

ECHOES FROM THE SOUTH.

Some lonefieent spirit, with a view to tire dull days succeeding to the Exhibition, put it into the bead of the Y.M.C.A. to obtain the permission of the Town b oum-il to erect what purpsvrts to be a "t'ofiee Shelter in front of the Cargill m-vnument. Now. the said monument is deemed one of the chief ornaments of the city of Ounedin. and occupies a prominent position in toe centre of the town. It i- also the focus whereat the local • cabbies congregate in pursuance of their calling at hours both seemly ami unseemly during the twenty-four. Had the said ’ < offee Shelter whatever that may mrar. been open in the -tea>i h--'irs of the night when the • pubs ' were closed and cabby in no danger of being let! astray in the p-ursuit of strong li-juor-. and when a eup of h--t moeha would have been comforting to his troubled inside, it might have teen welcomed by the fraternity, and became a true ' eabutan s rest. But to erect and keep» such an institution otene-i during the hours when liquor is to be had at half a dozen a-i--jaeent comer— b»k.- to the eyes of the virtuous Jehu like a reflection upon his character, as if lie were to le weanesl from aleobol by the mere dangling of codee-cupo and sausage-rolls beneath his very nose. * An-i more, says the ;<arriotie Mr Fish who. -tramzely enough, has m> sympathy in favour of cold water principles, and has a side glance to the kindly offices of cabby and his connections at the approaching polling seas»>n , ’ -hall -uch a hideous -zrueture athis—a cross between a -entry-box an-i a lamp-post—be permitted to obscure the grateful tribute to the memory of a public benefactor an-i deface our meet imp»«sing entourage - And so the Exhibition being over, ami everybody suffering from lack of money to spend and excitement to seek, public interest has concentrated itself around the unlucky ealmen’s rest, which in letters leagues *ong iias beets condemned as a moral ami physical obstruction, ami ha- been made the subject of discussion at a crowded meeting addressed by some of our leading public men. It is strange an-i passing strange that with so many hotels abounding there should be such especial effervescence of publie indignation over a eoffee-stall, ami the unoffending structure Be doomed to removal. Mr Burton, manager of the Colonial Bans in Ihinedin, left last week for the North on a six weeks’ holiday. He will spend his well-earned leave in a trip round the North Islam! and in Australia- Mr Burton was for many years the p»>pular manager of the Auckland branch of the Bank. The irrepresable Mr Joubert is again to the fore. If his great ancestor, the funeral Joubert who was topp-led over in his race for snp-reme power •with the Great Napoleon by itn untoward Austrian bullet, has! lived and shown the elasticity ami resourcefulness of his nephew. "Wellington and our other Peninsular heroes might have had to take to their heels, and the history of that epoch of our race require to have been written the other way about. But the nephew comes not as the exponent of shot and of sword, but as the harbinger of peaceful exhibitions, and now. in a slack interval, as the prop-het ami projector of an industry which is to lift us out of hopelessness and depression. Sweet and honeyei are the proposals of Mr Joubert this time. Saccharine is his text. ‘ Not as my uncle came come I unto you—not with bombs and -hrapnel. but with beetroot and sugar. The man upon whom the cloak of my great progenitor fell —the Gieat Napoleon—aved France in the' matter of sugar. In those days, some eighty years ago. the British cruisers so -everely 'protected' the French mannfaerurer that not only had he no competition in the matter of foreign sugar, but he iia-l actually no -ugar-cane out of which to make it. Youthful France could m-t develop- its tissues properly for lack --f the neressary earbonace-.-u.- element. Beautiful France sighed at the New Year on viewing the absence -»f amongst frs an-i old campaigner's growled on the boulevards at having to drink their ->«r> very much Kvif and very much •»« aeifwrcf. 'lf.' reasons Mr Joubert, 'foreign cruisers should interrupt the supplies, you in New Zealand will als-- be starved in the matter of sugar. Solve the problem as did Napoleon. Cultivate the beet. Here in Vtago the beet-rapt will grow •is MrrrefZfc It will come to perfection in the off-season when you at j-re-ent -io little but kick your heel- about . : . :■ hr-titute it- culture. In a little while you will cease imp-.ning £23.000 worth of sugar a year, and be putting the money into your ■ «n i-- ket-. Al»ove all fl-at a company for the manufacture. ami let me. from my own country, /-< France, procure the plant ami p—t you up- regarding the methods. There is money in it. and what I ask in return is not exces--ive. An-1 at first blu-h it does l->-k a- if Mr Jouliert were n--t -peaking as a visionary. If it were m-t for the squabbles of the uie-iical fraternity the I’ress would lose one great source of excitement, and be groping alout anxiously in all sorts of deviou- directions seeking an efficient -übstitute therefor. Truth, be it -ai-i.

liowever. that as a rule, though the pn-fessions differ over points of p ractice or of theory, being perfectly ready to break up one another's persons in establishing the true principle for mending another'-, in the matter of fees they are usually long-suffering. Dr. Stenhouse ami the Comtuiitee c-f the H-opdtal have this time dissented upx-n the subject of money, ete., not -rf management. It is just a little question of £5 3s. This is the little rift within the lute which, far from making the music mute, is rearing a fre-a ebullition of sound ami fury in the columns of the daily press, ami a warm interchange <rf compliments. Doctors are not business men. If you ean -trike the legitimate total of your claim against a hospital, it doesn't matter much about the items of the account, says Dr. Stenhouse- You didn't p«y me for attend ing a p«itieni of yours at Kavensbourne. so you ought to p-av me for attending one of my own at Ssuth Dunedin. ' No,' -ay the Finance Committee. ' --ne claim so odd as this doesn't make things even. We can't in our capacity admit account'alance’.' like this. So Dr. Stenh-mse wraps his mantle around him and withdraws to the exclusive sphere of blown practice, where he can vamp up his own accounts to his own fancy, and there lie no one to say him ‘Nay.' After all is it not a pretty squabble or a noble bone of contention on the p-arr of the Committee, a- doctors do much work that canm-t be estimate-! by dead reckoning ? Rumour say - t hat rimes are going to be hard with us this winter in Dunedin. Since the Exhibition closed things have t-een gradually tightening, and the passenger lists of the Tekapo ami Jubilee -how that the exodus of our p>op-si-larion in the direction of New South Wales is still proceeding. Yet, in the face of this it is everywhere asserted that the land is crying for pop-ulativn. As judged by the statistics of newly arriving pilgrims, puloted into New Zealand by the merikal men, ami not by the -hipping companies, it is more true that there is a large and increasing population crying f*-*r what at present their mothers can alone snp-p-lv but who give us the most bounteous birth-rate in the world. If the Bsalmist enjoyed the contentp-lation of what he preached he would soon in these days pack up his valise and take his passage at Port Said for these parts in order to witness the arrows in the quiver of New Zealand. These increase actually at double the rate of those of Madame Britannia, ami yet Zealamiia is crying for population. Two years ago the population of New Zealand did not increase by one per cent., though by births alone it should have increased by three per -ent. This means that in that year more than 12.000 adults must have left-for other lands, and their places are supqdied by a similar number of babies. Loving couples unite at early ages ami lose no time in realizing their parental ideals; but we want more than this. We require to fin-l work for our adults, and to keep them at home. It seems more natural to say that our p-sp-ulati-vn is crying for the land and for some reason or another it canm-.r get it : bur perhaps Mr Joubert, by virtue of his beet-root sngar scheme, will contrive to get more of us to stick on.